1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wire harness, in which, in order to form a branch circuit configured with a plurality of wires included in a wire harness main body and for other purposes, a plurality of wire terminals, which are each respectively provided at ends of wires are electrically shorted to one another by a joint connector. The present invention also relates to an assembling method of such a wire harness.
2. Description of Related Art
Related Art 1, for example, discloses such a wire harness, which has a joint connector bound to a peripheral surface of a wire harness main body with tape.
Specifically, the joint connector includes a joint terminal shorting the wire terminals to one another and a connector housing configured to hold the joint terminal and the wire terminals. The connector housing includes a housing main body and a cover. The housing main body has terminal insertion sections to which the wire terminals are inserted and terminal locking tabs on a top wall of the terminal insertion sections, locking the wire terminals inserted into the terminal insertion sections. When the wire terminals are inserted between a bottom wall of the housing main body and the terminal locking tabs, a locked portion provided on a top surface of each of the wire terminals engages with the terminal locking tab, so that the wire terminals are locked in a position in contact with the joint terminal. Each of the wire terminals contacts the joint terminal, and thereby the wire terminals are shorted to one another. The cover covers an entire top surface of the housing main body including the terminal locking tabs, and restricts upward displacement of the terminal locking tabs (i.e., displacement in a direction in which the terminal locking tabs separate from the wire terminals, and unlock the engagement). The joint connector that houses the wire terminals shorted to one another as described above is wrapped around an periphery surface of the wire harness main body with a tape, such that the bottom wall of the housing main body faces the wire harness main body.
In the above-described conventional wire harness, the cover covering the entire top surface of the housing main body is provided to the joint connector, such that the locking force, by which the terminal locking tabs locks the wire terminals, is maintained by restricting displacement of the terminal locking tabs. Therefore, the cover increases the projection amount of the joint connector from the wire harness main body.
[Related Art 1] Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. 2005-50794